The present invention relates generally to optical imaging, and more particularly to how to best fuse target information from multiple images into a single target image.
One approach for optical target recognition, usually for viewing by a human operator, fuses multiple target images with respect to a reference image of interest, often merely the first target of many target images. The goal is to create a fused image that is optimally “information rich” to a human operator at a lowest computational cost.
The reference image is usually an original optical image produced by a digital imaging device such as a digital camera. Modern military systems may include a variety of additional sensor devices able to produce images based not only on multiple electromagnetic radiation frequencies, so-called multi-spectral images that include frequencies below and above the normal visual range, but also based on other than electromagnetic radiation.
A particular problem is computation cost, particularly computational speed.
Complicating this process is that an original reference image may be compromised by having too little or too much light, reduced contrast or size, and cluttered with other objects that confuse a user, as well as other possible image defects.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide new and improved methods for fusing target information from multiple images into a single target image.